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I’m going to go out on a limb here with a prediction. The energy world will look exactly the same the day after October 28th, 2011, as it did yesterday. Why? On October 28th we’re expecting a public demonstration of a “revolutionary” new energy device in Bologna, Italy. The magic technology? Another too-cheap-to-meter construct called the “e-cat” machine invented and promoted by Italian Andrea Rossi. Cold fusion … again, but with an updated label; Low-Energy Nuclear Reaction. Will it change the world? No. Will it work? Doubt it.

The lust for abundant cheap energy is entirely understandable. Fellow Forbes columnist Mark Gibbs eloquently articulates the appeal in his Hello Cheap Energy, Hello Brave New World column, as well as providing a helpful overview of the Italian cold fusion guys and their claims.

But here’s the deal. There is no new physics in energy. There could be, in theory, one day. Indeed, there will almost certainly be, one day (a subject for another column in due course). But let’s sidestep the science issues – i.e., whether cold fusion is bunk or real – and just deal with reality.

Wished-for revolutions in energy technology are pervasive, and they all suffer from one or all of the following three fallacies:

First is the Magic Wand Fallacy.

You’ve heard this claim in many forms: invent a new energy source, a magically efficient or powerful machine, and it will change the world and do so overnight. Except that it won’t. Even if the new invention were real, the problem of inertia remains.

Inertia in physics is one of the most inscrutable phenomena. Not to digress, but inertia is the singularly intractable problem in the world of Star Trek; you could imagine a space ship with an anti-matter power source that could accelerate like the Enterprise, but it would require a parallel universe to imagine how to prevent inertia from resulting in all of the humans inside becoming a thin film of organic goo pasted against the bulkhead.

Inertia is universal and intransigent in economic and social systems as well. The time from discovery, to significant impact is very long. It just takes a lot of time to overcome the imbedded inertia in enormous infrastructure systems, behaviors and operations. Let’s consider two examples of truly magical changes in the long history of energy technologies. The photovoltaic effect was what gave Einstein his 1921 Nobel Prize. The first atomic chain reaction was in 1942. (Atomic fission is not just a little better than everything else, it is thousands of times better in energy density terms.) They're both important. But the world did not change overnight. Today both solar energy and nuclear power still only contribute marginally to global energy needs.

If our Italian brethren, or anyone else for that matter, do achieve the equivalent of first fission, it’ll be a long time before it matters. The scale of the global energy market is enormous. But wait, the technorati remind us, look how fast 21st century technologies virally expand, from iPhones to smart-phone apps. But in energy terms, an app is almost unimaginably ‘light’. To put it in physics terms –- a water bug’s inertia is to an iPhone app what an aircraft carrier is to a city’s energy requirements. No amount of wishing can change that.

Second is the Helicopter Fallacy.

When practical helicopters were finally invented, a lot of people thought they would revolutionize both car and air travel. (For an excellent history of the long pursuit of the seemingly impossible feat of making a helicopter work, see The God Machine by James Chiles.) The manufacture and use of helicopters is a multi-billion-dollar industry, providing both vital and entertaining services. But one would no more use a helicopter to fly the Atlantic (it is doable … just a lot of refueling and inconvenience, and expense) than say employ a nuclear reactor to run a train, or photovoltaic systems to run a country. All have uses, all significant. But they are rarely mutually exclusive or deeply competitive uses. The range of application for energy technologies is broader and deeper than helicopters and jets.